Thanks to yet another administrative balls-up, half of my pay for the month is MIA. Knowing their horrendously red-taped payroll procedure I won’t be able to recover the difference until next month. Helpfully, I pay the rent tomorrow, which will gobble up all of this month’s semi-salary, and most of what’s left in my current account, leaving me totally broke. Great.
Words fail me. 
I was accused yesterday of being sad. Not sad in the depressed sense of the word either. Now let’s just review the evidence shall we?
- Today I got up at the break of dawn to queue in the freezing cold in order to obtain a wristband that provides me access to an autograph signing. The celebrity in question is a wrestler.
- I then had McDonalds breakfast. On my own. (By that I mean I was the only customer in the store.)
- I then actually LOL’d (”laughed out loud”) when a monitor in the window of Silverscreen was displaying the blue screen of death.
- I just used the terms “LOL’d” and “blue screen of death” and it doesn’t feel that stupid.
- I am now sitting at my computer listening to a playlist which includes the Beach Boys, the theme music of the Cannonball Run, and four Street Fighter music discs, which were only released in Japan.
- Having just eaten one of those Kinder Hippo things.
Now come on. Does that sound like the diary of a sad man to you? What? Yeah, well fuck you for thinking it!
I just got up for a walkabout for the first time after sitting at my desk working non-stop for 6 hours and 3 minutes. I wonder if I can sue UCL when I develop deep vein thrombosis? My thighs and lower back are now a mess thanks to my self-enforced immobility. My stomach, too, is a mess, owing to the fact that I only had time to bring a measly sandwich with me today which did not do the old hunger-satisfaction thing.
Tomorrow I leave the house at 5:30 am to join the motley queue of WWE (née WWF) die-hards forming outside HMV on Oxford Street, because the first 500 people to buy the 3-DVD box set chronicling the career of wrestling legend Bret “Hitman” Hart will get to meet the guy at 6:00 pm that evening - an opportunity I simply cannot pass up.
A similar event took place at Hamley’s last year, featuring current WWE wrestler Big Show. I felt pretty clever catching an early (for me, a student bum at the time) tube at 10 am for a 2 pm signing, only to find about 1000 die-hards queuing ahead of me, over a hundred of whom had done so overnight. Suffice to say I didn’t meet him. I did, however, find a place to grab some breakfast, followed by several beers at a pub off Carnaby Street. Then I waited by the staff exit at Hamley’s to get his autograph on the way out. It was a great (albeit slightly stalkerish) idea, except I wasn’t the only one to think of it. In fact, I think every 4-child family within the M25 perimeter had thought of it and descended like locusts when he made his appearance. Big Show came out and shook everyone’s hand, but only had time to pose and sign autographs for the kids in attendance (the snivelling little shits) and bugger off. C’est la vie.
My internet with Newnet is activated on Tuesday, allegedly. Woo!
Last night was pretty good. What was supposed to be a straightforward drink with some friends turned into a pub crawl, meandering through the streets of Central London from Bond St to Edgware Road. From humble beginnings in a packed Mayfair boozer, we staggered into pub after pub after pub, then ventured into an upmarket Brazilian cocktail bar (sampling a fantastic Caipirinha), then ended the night in a West London tapas bar, where the alcohol I had consumed (despite my insistance to stay relatively sober) was soaked up by octopus, clams, chorizo and wine, and various other delicious edibles. Yum.
Today, by contrast, is a bit of a downer. I didn’t win the Euromillions jackpot. Or the National Lottery jackpot. Then I watched Battle Royale 2 - a film I have anticipated for quite some time, and which I had devoted 2 hours to watching this afternoon - and was thoroughly disappointed. Not a patch on the original.
I just read that statistically speaking one is more likely to be struck by a comet than win the Euromillions lottery. Click here for the link. Furthermore, a past winner now lives with hundreds of begging letters per week, kidnap plots and death threats. So, am I going to try to beat odds of 80 million to one and spend the rest of my days stuck in my mansion and living in fear? Is a £75million windfall really worth that?
Erm… Yes!
(I think £75million can comfortably afford a name change by deed poll and a full-time security squad, and I could light fat cigars with the begging letters.)
Now, on a totally unrelated tangent… what the hell?
This is a mish-mash of stuff I’ve been up to. I don’t think I’ll be able to cleverly segue between these mentionables, so I won’t bother.
I am torn between going to see Guns 2 Roses tonight - a Guns n Roses tribute band I’ve been looking forward to seeing - and going out with a group of friends from halls I haven’t seen in months. I toyed with the idea of both, but seeing as the gig is in Walthamstow it makes that job difficult.
Speaking of Guns N’ Roses, according to Axl Rose himself - someone who is notoriously tight-lipped about such matters - GNR’s 14-years-in-production album Chinese Democracy is going to be heard this year. I won’t hold my breath.
Knowing I’m leaving Bulldog and have only them as an alternative, BT tried to covertly charge me £75 to get reconnected, then had the gall to sign me up to a 12-month contract. I rang them up yesterday morning, did my best Mr. Angry Customer impression, and they relented.
Angry phone call #2 was to Bulldog, who - despite promising to terminate my contract on December 17th - charged me an extra £60 this month. They gave in (eventually).
Watched Cube, Cube 2 and Cube Zero this week. (And yes, you are supposed to watch them in that order.) They are really very good, and I recommend you watch them. I always like it when I enjoy a film starring a cast of unknowns - I feel like I’ve got one up on everyone else.
One of the websites I’ve been working on at UCL is nearing completion and is looking good, even if I say so myself. Ironically, this comes at a time when my job is at risk - the grant funding that my job depends on is looking increasingly unlikely to come through, meaning that come April or May I’ll be seeking alternative employment. I’m gutted, but I’m also grateful that I’ve had such a good opportunity here, and happy that my contract termination isn’t a result of poor performance or them not liking me.
I was bored this morning so wrote back to another one of those 419 scams today. My would-be scammer, one Mr. Bill Dooru, answered promptly, asking for an address to which he could send me the important documents. I gave him this:
Big Ben LeClock, Westminster Bridge, London, SW1A 0FU, UK.
Feeling happy with my potential scam-bait, I discovered this site, which shows people successfully baiting these bastards a million times better than me.
I just finished a three-page epic complaint letter to the head of the Royal Mail Docklands delivery office, owing to the fact that the gimps he employs can’t do anything right. In summary:
- They lost 2 special deliveries in as many months worth several hundred quid
- Postmen never buzz to see if anyone’s in before leaving a “sorry, you were out” card (especially if you’ve taken a day off because you knew there was mail coming…)
- Put recorded items in your mailbox without obtaining a signature
- If they do leave a card, the phone number of it doesn’t work and the identifying details of the delivery are omitted, rendering the mail near impossible to trace
- Etc.
I don’t have much luck with mail or couriers.
the good - Fedex (though hideously expensive), Special Mail Services
the bad - Initial City Link, Parcel Force, DHL
the ugly - Royal Mail
My 48-hour foray into the world of gambling is over. I discovered betfair.com, an incredibly addictive (once you grasp the rules) betting site where you can get the latest odds as a game is in progress.
Through a series of well-timed small bets on the darts final and the ongoing Masters snooker tournament I was able to “beat the bookie” on several occasions, meaning I had bet on each competitor with such odds that either way I’d win some money, or not lose anything at least. That isn’t to say I didn’t lose money, but my net profit was about £50 as of this evening.
Being an idiot, I didn’t quit while I was ahead - I then got my fingers burnt betting on the outcome of a frame of the Peter Ebdon V Stuart Bingham match. Ebdon was ruling the match and the current frame, so much so that his (decimal) odds of winning that frame and the match at the time were as low as 1.02, meaning for each £100 you slapped on you stood to win just £2. I, however, had stuck £30 on him when his odds were 1.80. But it was all for nothing as his opponent made a miraculous comeback and cost Ebdon the frame, and cost me £30.
I console myself with the fact that I eventually quit with £20 that I didn’t have before, and the fact that some poor bastard was so sure of Ebdon’s victory that 2 before he was beaten, he slapped down over 2 grand at 1.02 (where he would only have won about £40 had Ebdon won). Silly bastard.
Google Earth has uncovered the World’s Largest Post-It Note, which lives in Thailand - Link